Footwear assembling conveyer



April 3, 1934. E. l.. PATTEN WEAR ASSEMBLING CONVEYER FOOT Filed Sept. 28, 1928 3 Sheets- Sheet 1 A TT RNEY April 3, 1934.

425 Sheets- Sheet 2 Filed Sept. 28, 1928 INVENTOR. 7//652 l. H7170? l rl,

A TTRNEY April 3, 1934. E L PATTEN i 1,953,255

FOOTWEAR A'S SEMBLING CONVEYER Filed Sept. 28, 1928 3 Sheets- Sheet 5 lV-"V -\I l' 1N VENTO/e.

Patented Apr. 3, 1934 PATENT 'OFFICE FOOTWEAR ASSEMBLING CONVEYER i Ernest L. Patten, New Haven, Conn., assignor to American Rubber Company, East Cambridge, Mass., a corporation of Massachusetts Application September 28, 1928, Serial No. 309,100

4 Claims.

This invention relates to a conveyer upon which footwear may be assembled.

Heretofore in the construction of rubber or rubber and fabric footwear is has been usual to employ a trained operator who performed all operations incident to the assembling of the article from prepared blanks. Such an operator necessarily had to be highly skilled in the art, which necessitated a long training period and resulted in a highly paid operator which increased the cost of building footwear.

It is an object of this invention to provide a device whereby the operations of building foot-- wear may be separated so that the individual workmen need not be skilled in as many operations, with the result that their training period may be short and the cost of production correspondingly lower.

Another object of the invention is to Vprovide a machine whereby footwear may be built in steps, thus requiring less handling of the materials which go to make up the article of footwear and which reduces the necessary handling of the form upon which the article is built.

c Other objects of my invention will become obvious in the detailed description which follows, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 is an end elevation of my invention;

Fig. 2 .is a side elevation partly in section of one end of my machine;

Fig. 3 is an elevation of the other end of my machine;

Fig. 4 is a detailed View showing the manner in which they guides are supported;

Fig. 5 is a detailed view showing a modication; and y Fig. 6 is a detailed view showing a further modification.

In building the article of footwear, the materials of the article are applied about the form or last 1 which is supported upon the pin 2 extending from an aperture in plate 3. A split collar 4 is fastened to the plate 3 by means of screw 5 and extends about the pin 2 and is provided with a screw 6 for tightening the collar about the pin to adjustably hold the latter against rotation. The plate 3 is rotatably mounted by means of pin '7 in an extension 8 of frame carriage 11. The plate 3 is adjustably held against rotation-by means of spring pressed detents 9 carried in extension 8 which cooperate with apertures l0 in the plate 3. Carriage 11 has slots 12 in which are rotatably' mounted in any suitable manner the rollers 13 which engage the respective upper and lower surfaces of a pair of guides 14.

The guides 14 are fastened to the frame 15 by screws 16 or otherwise, there being braces 17 fastened to the frame members 18 for supporting the guides 14 at suitable intervals, as indicated in Fig. 4.

A brace 19 is fastened in any suitable manner as by bolts or screws to the carriage 11, and the brace 19l is connected by means of link 20 fwith the chain 2l. Chain 2l is trained over sprockets 22 and 23 disposed at opposite ends of the machine, the sprocket 23 being journalled by means of shaft 24 in frame 15.

Sprocket 22 is rigidly-mounted upon the shaft 25 which is journalled in suitable bearings in frames 15 and 29. The shaft 25 carries worm wheel 26 which engages with worm 27 keyed on shaft 28, which is mounted in suitable bearings in the frame 29. Shaft 28 carriesspur gear 30 which engages with pinion 31 carried on shaft-` 32, which shaft is driven by spur gear 33 mounted thereon and pinion v34 mounted on shaft 35 of the motor 36.

At the top of the machine is mounted a table 37 supported from the frame 15 by brace 38. This table is of long narrow construction and the guides 14 follow thecontour of the table. The table serves as a convenient support for the materials from which the article is built and the tools used by the operatives.

In the operation of the machine the motor 36, through the motion transmitting and speed reducing mechanism, drives the shaft 25 thereby rotating the sprocket 22 to set the chain 21 into motion. The motion of the chain 21 moves the carriage 11 along the guides 14, thereby transporting the last or form 1 from operator to operator, each operator applying certain elements of the article so that when the carriage has completed a round of the table, the various elements of the article have been applied and the article finally completed. The adjustable mounting of the plate 3 relative to the extension 8 allows the operator to adjust the angle at which the form or last 1 is held, as suits his convenience. It is obvious that any number of carriages may be mounted upon the guide 14 and driven by the chain 21, whereby a continuous succession of work is carried past the'station of each opera- 105 tive, so that as soon as he has finished his operation on one of the lasts, the succeeding carriage has brought the next last to position to receive similar treatment.

In Fig. 5 there is shown a modification of the llO rollers which serve to support the carriage 11 on the guides 14. In this case the two rollers 131-131 aremounted on .the same axle and provided Iwith sloping converging faces which engage the contiguous faces of the guides 14. In Fig. 6 a still further modification of the roller mounting is shown in which the frame 11 is supported by means of pulley 132 upon .the cylindrical guides 142.

While certain modifications of my invention have been described in detail as examples of my invention, it is not intended to limit my invention thereto inasmuch as many variations in the details of the machine may be made all within the scope of my invention, which is indicated bythe following claims.

Having thus describedmy invention, what I claim and desire to protect by Letters'Patent is:

` 1. A conveyer for making footwear having in combination a table, a pair of parallel guides ad- `jacent the table and shaped to follow the contour of the table, a carriage adapted to move along said guides, means for imparting movement to said carriage, a footwear support rotatably mounted on the carriage and provided with an apertured plate, the carriage being provided with spring pressed detents adapted to engage said apertures to hold the plate in adjusted position.

3. A conveyer for making footwear having in combination a table, a pair of parallel guides adjacent .the table and shaped to follow the contour of the table, a carriage adapted to move along said guides, means for imparting movement to said carriage, a footwear support rotatably mounted on the carriage and provided with an apertured plate, the carriage being provided with spring pressedfdetents adapted to engage said apertures to hold theplate in adjusted position, said carriagebeing provided with rollers in pairs, the faces vof the rollers of each pair being angularly disposed and adapted to engage corresponding faces on the guides.

4. A conveyer for making footwear having, in combination, a table, a pair of guides arranged parallel to each other in a vertical plane below the table and shaped to follow the contour of the table, a vertically Varranged carriage mounted upon and movable along said guides, means for imparting *movement to said carriage, a footwear support mounted upon the carriage, said carriage being provided with rollers `arranged in pairs, the faces of the rollers of each pair being angularly disposed and adapted to engage corresponding faces on the guides.,

ERNEST L. PATTEN. 

